


Tripping

by TolkienGirlArchive (TolkienGirl)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Early season 3, F/M, Flirting, Innuendo, Light Angst, Neverland (Once Upon a Time)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 12:29:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18151898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TolkienGirl/pseuds/TolkienGirlArchive
Summary: An accidental moment, shared.





	Tripping

She doesn't know why she's thinking of him.

She should be wholly devoting her thoughts to everything else, because there  _is_  so much else—most of all Henry. How can she be distracted, even for a moment, from Henry?

 _I'm not_ , she reminds herself, and it's true. His precious little face hasn't left her thoughts…it's just sharing space in her mind with another face, far less innocent, and rather dangerously handsome.

_Hook. Damnit._

There he is, a few steps in front of her, with his rakish, rolling seaman's gait, long and lean and enigmatic like a cat. A black cat.

 _Bad luck for sure._  Emma frowns, trying to focus her mind on everything— _anything_ —else: the exotic, alien fragrance of the dark-flowered ivy that clings around trees as tall as memory ( _Were they the only things that grew old in Neverland?_ ); the heavy hum of invisible insects in the thick air; the ache in her heart for Henry, and maybe even for Neal ( _There, think about Neal! That's a distraction…until it's not…_ ); the way the leather-clad shoulders before her are always jauntily, confidently squared ( _Was he ever afraid?_ )

Emma curses internally again—somehow her mind had betrayed her and come full circle again. Caught in the tangle of thoughts that she herself has woven, she forgets herself and trips—hard—over a raised, gnarled root.

She barely has a moment to register that she hasn't fallen, that instead, something— _someone_ —has caught her, not only saving her the fall but also slipping her wrist into the manacle of a silver hook, and so positioning her that she is now wrapped in the arms of the…enemy.

"Careful there, love," he murmurs. He only has to murmur, because he and his intoxicatingly jaunty grin are  _very_  close to her indeed.

"Let me, go, Hook, or I swear—"

"Manners, manners," he chides, while that teasing flicker continues to dance in his eyes. His eyes—they're so blue. Was it three hundred years at sea that had allowed them to absorb something of the elusive, cerulean depths?

"I wasn't going to shock you with my sailor-mouth, as ironic as that would be," she hisses, more conscious than she wants to be that the cold metal of his hook is still imprisoning her, while she is pressed against him—also a prison, but not cold at all—"I was going to swear to call my father. He's not too far ahead."

He releases her, but somehow she's the one who feels vanquished. It's a frustrating idea, and it raises her mental hackles as though  _she_  were the cat now  _(Maybe they both are)._ "Now, now—that's not playing fair."

"You're scared of David?" She uses the taunt as a cover for her flushing cheeks, which are betraying her, and so that she has a moment to regain her footing. The line isn't fooling him though—he is standing, with that perfect yet nonchalant posture, his hands—hand and hook, really—thrust deep into the pockets of his leather coat…eyeing her with that unreadable gaze that hints at admiration and interest and desire all at once.

"Terrified," he returns, seemingly guileless, but his eyebrows tilt up, mockingly punctuating his words.

"Well if you're not scared of him, you should be of me," she says lamely. She puts her hands in pockets, trying to look intimidating, but takes them out immediately afterwards, since she suddenly notices that she's accidentally mirroring him.

He's noticed too, and his eyes are amused. It's horrible.  _And attractive,_  she can't help thinking, and very nearly gives herself a real slap on the wrist for being an idiot.

"You're quite frightening, Swan. Especially in the morning. But maybe that's just remorse for an uneventful night—"

She very nearly reaches out to slap him, but that would be childish, so she merely sets her jaw and glowers at him.

He only smiles mischievously in reply. Sometimes it's hard to remember he's a villain, even when he's infuriating her. "Don't over-exert yourself, Darling. Wouldn't want you to tire yourself out."

She doesn't reply, just keeps glaring at him.

And then something changes. She has no idea what it is, and probably he doesn't either. Their exchange had been no different than usual, but somehow they both just managed to look straight, unbarred, into each other's eyes. Emma's not sure to make of what she sees in his. ( _If he did steal something from the ocean, certainly it was its depth_ ). She feels her lips part slightly, as though she's about to speak. When she exhales, the breath seems curiously wasted, as though there were words she ought to have said but knew not where to start.

His fingertips toy with the end of his hook. She imagines that it's the equivalent of someone twisting their fingers together, but he has to make do with what he has.

_(Normally, she thinks of his hook as part of that insufferable panache of his, but maybe, after all, he'd rather have a hand)_

They're still looking at each other, and Emma, unable to remain in her thoughts when his eyes are piercing her soul ( _or showing her his—if pirates have souls—_ ) begins to blush again.

"What do you want?" she asks, and the question's left her lips before she has time to realize that asking it will break the moment ( _if_   _there even is one_ ).

His face clouds over with impenetrable charm. "Do you even have to ask, love?" And there it is once more, all sly innuendo and titillating glances. Business as usual.

Even though it makes her fingertips tingle— _it shouldn't, Swan,_  she scolds herself, before realizing that she's addressing herself by the same name he does—she can't help but be a little disappointed. For one moment—( _if there are even moments in Neverland_ ) _—_ she had thought that he was going to be serious.

_You're just bumbling…you've lost your sharp wits. Tripping, that's what you are, literally and figuratively._

She nearly sighed, but it was extinguished by a new thought.

Maybe, just maybe—he's tripping too. His footing is sure, unshakeable on sea and on land, but what about his heart?

_(What about hers?)_


End file.
